1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments of the invention relate to analyzing a sample with Raman spectroscopy. In particular, embodiments relate to analyzing a sample containing a single nucleic acid derivative of interest contained within a spectroscopic analysis chamber with stimulated or coherent anti-Stokes Raman spectroscopy.
2. Background Information
Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) sequencing has many commercially important applications in the fields of medical diagnosis, drug discovery, and treatment of disease. Existing methods for DNA sequencing, based on detection of fluorescence labeled DNA molecules that have been separated by size, are limited by the length of the DNA that can be sequenced. Typically, only 500 to 1,000 bases of DNA sequence can be determined at one time. This is much shorter than the length of the functional unit of DNA, referred to as a gene, which can be tens or even hundreds of thousands of bases in length. Using current methods, determination of a complete gene sequence requires that many copies of the gene be produced, cut into overlapping fragments and sequenced, after which the overlapping DNA sequences may be assembled into the complete gene. This process is laborious, expensive, inefficient and time-consuming. It also typically requires the use of fluorescent or radioactive labels, which can potentially pose safety and waste disposal problems.
More recently, methods for DNA sequencing have been developed involving hybridization to short oligonucleotides of defined sequence, attached to specific locations on DNA chips. Such methods may be used to infer short DNA sequences or to detect the presence of a specific DNA molecule in a sample, but are not suited for identifying long DNA sequences.